AE-DOC: matheism-and-psychonics

Chapter 2: Mathematical Psychogenesis

Pure mathematical truth is infinite, eternal, immutable, omnipresent, and infinitely complex. It is exactly just such characteristics which are necessary for a thing to serve as the ultimate foundation and cause of all of reality. (This is why, in fact, a supernatural creator is often imagined as having these characteristics.) Despite all of this, however, pure mathematical truth is almost never talked about as being the ultimate foundation and cause of all reality. This is because mathematics is intangible, and it is not obvious at all how intangible pure mathematical truth can give rise to our experience of tangible reality.

To bridge the gap between the intangibility and immutability of pure mathematical truth, on the one hand, and the existence of a tangible reality which changes over time, on the other, Scionics invokes something which is also physically intangible (in the conventional sense) although changeable over time: raw unorganized consciousness itself. Before moving forward, however, it is important to make a clear distinction between the terms consciousness and mind.

Regardless of how these terms are used elsewhere, for our purposes consciousness (or raw consciousness) will be defined as the physically intangible stuff of awareness itself; it simultaneously has awareness, and also reacts to that which it is aware of. (The thing which it has awareness of, and reacts to, is itself, or its own contents.) In its most common, general or raw form, consciousness is essentially disorganized. Mind, on the other hand, is an organized form of consciousness, such as is found in biological organisms, where it is has arisen as a result of biological evolution via natural selection. To reiterate, mind is an organized form of otherwise disorganized consciousness. (This may be compared with a brick house, which is an organized form of an otherwise disorganized pile of bricks.)

Having made this distinction between consciousness and mind, we can now delve into the nature of consciousness itself. This can be done through a bit of reflection upon one's own conscious experiences. Some of this may seem to be obvious or even tautological, but it is important that these facts be laid out explicitly and clearly, so that the conclusions which follow may also be clearly understood.

Firstly, consciousness is only aware of itself, i.e., of its own contents, and is never aware of anything outside of itself. While it is certainly possible for new information to enter consciousness from without (such as through our senses) it is not possible for consciousness to be aware of anything which has not entered consciousness. It may be said, then, that from the perspective of consciousness, only that which exists within itself exists, and conversely, that which does not exist within itself does not exist.

From the inside, then, consciousness perceives itself as all that exists. From the outside, however, consciousness is perceived as nothing. One cannot directly observe the consciousness, qua consciousness, of another. (One may be able to observe the neural firings in another's brain, but then one is observing, not consciousness itself, but merely neural firings which correspond with consciousness.) Again, from the inside, consciousness is everything; from the outside, it is nothing.

Consciousness also always experiences itself unitarily, i.e., as a single unitary entity, or as a oneness; conversely, consciousness never experiences itself as any sort of multiplicity. Two separate, unconnected “pieces” of consciousness would have no awareness of each other, but if they were to come into contact so as to be no longer separate, then they would no longer experience themselves as differentiated, but as a unified oneness. (A good analogy here would be of water droplets: Two separate droplets of water, perhaps sitting a centimeter apart on a countertop, would be two separate droplets of water. If they were to come into contact, however, they would immediately coalesce, ceasing to be two separate droplets, and would instead exist as a single larger droplet.)

Finally, there is the action of consciousness. Consciousness is not merely an awareness, but also a simultaneous reaction to that of which it is aware. Consciousness operates on the hedonic principle, i.e., it reacts to that which it is aware of such that it seeks to keep or increase pleasure, and to eliminate or decrease pain, or to maximize hedonic value. Stated differently, consciousness reacts towards pleasure and away from pain.

Having thus laid out the consciousness/mind distinction, and also having explicitly described some of the essential aspects of consciousness, we can now put forward the hypothesis of mathematical psychogenesis, which states:

Mathematical psychogenesis entails that the mathematical nature of raw consciousness is such that consciousness must exist at all times and places where mathematical truth exists. Since mathematical truth exists at all places and times, it then follows that, likewise, raw consciousness must also exist at all places and times. Since there are no gaps in reality where mathematical truth is not true, mathematical truth forms a continuous gapless plenum throughout all reality; likewise, an intangible continuous plenum of raw consciousness also exists throughout all reality.

To put this into technical terms, one may say that a psychonic plenum, or psychonic field, permeates all existence, and actually is all existence. In more traditional, albeit mystical-sounding terms, raw cosmic consciousness permeates and is all existence. Despite how it may sound, however, this is not some sort of new-age mysticism. It is based upon a very wide-scope exploration and integration of the nature of consciousness and mind, computational theory, cosmology, quantum mechanics, and reality itself, as will be demonstrated shortly.

Reality is thus panpsychic and pan-mathematical in nature, i.e., raw consciousness (in the form of the psychonic plenum or field) and mathematical truths exist everywhere; beyond that, reality is also ultimately comprised of or founded upon raw consciousness and mathematical truth. Furthermore, because this raw consciousness operates according to its own hedonic and mathematical nature, it may be said to be teleonomical rather than teleological in nature, i.e., it operates in a manner which is only apparently rather than actually goal-directed.